Ryan Jones to run London Marathon for East London Vision

Ryan Jones will be running to help people with sight loss when he takes on the London Marathon this weekend.

Ryan, who has vision impairment, is running the 26 miles from Blackheath and Greenwich Park to St James Park on Sunday, April 24 in support of East London Vision (ELVis).

ELVis aims to improve access to support and services for people with sight loss living in the seven boroughs of East London to improve their quality of life and increase individual independence.

Ryan has already raised more than £1000 of the £2000 he hopes to raise for ELVis.

It’s not the first time Ryan has tackled the marathon.

He ran it in 2013 in memory of a friend who passed away from a brain tumour and raised money for CLIC Sargent which supported his friend and their family.

Ryan said he had been running since he was 10 years old and attending a disability athletics session at his local park.

“I enjoy running because it is very much about pushing yourself, working hard and always being better than my previous run. I really thrive off achieving better results,” he said.

Ryan said he was running the London Marathon this year to help boost the services of ELVis.

“I want to raise as much money as possible and raise awareness of the support there is available to people living with sight loss in East London,” he said.

“Having a visual impairment myself, I know the importance of having a good support network around to help you get involved in activities rather than being isolated and feeling as though you’re unable to take part in activities because of having a visual impairment.”

He said he hoped to see more people benefiting from services ELVis offers in the future.

Ryan said he had enjoyed training for the marathon and had been doing two 5 mile runs during the week and a longer run on Sunday’s.

“Playing football every Saturday, either training or playing in a tournament, has been a great help to improve my fitness for the marathon.”